The Lumber-Room
The Lumber Room The text under analysis is written by an outstanding British novelist and short story writer Hector Munro. Hector Hugh Munro was a British writer, whose witty stories satirized Edwardian society and culture. The author’s style of writing is satirical in a humorous way. He uses a witty tone to mimic characters in order to subtly criticize them. The criticism is done in a subtle way that is humorous. The excerpt is homogeneous. The story is narrated in the 3rd person. This allows the reader to access the situation and the characters in an objective manner, because the characters are having both positive and negative viewpoints. The third person point of view is impersonal which fits the impersonal atmosphere of the household. The plot of the story revolves around a little orphan Nicholas who was trusted to his tyrannical and dull-witted aunt. One day Nicholas was “in disgrace”, so he made his Aunt believe that he was somehow trying to get into the gooseberry garden, but instead had no intention of doing so but did sneak into the Lumber Room. There a tremendous picture of a hunter and a stag opened to him. Soon his aunt tried to look for the boy and slipped into the rain-water tank. She asked Nicholas to fetch her a ladder but the boy pretended not to understand her, he said that she was the Evil One (This metaphor shows author’s irony and essential clue to the character). The plot is ordered chronologically, each episode is given with more and more emphasis. The author’s choice of vocabulary and stylistic devices in this story emphasize a deep dissension between generations, to convey a thrilling power of child’s creative mind. The author uses a large variety of stylistic devices, such as epithets to show us the great difference between the Child’s and Grown-up’s world. Such epithets from Child’s world (grim chuckle, alleged frog, unknown land, stale delight, mere material pleasure, bare and cheerless, thickly